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I took in a deep breath and croaked out my response. “Yeah.”
“Stay here.”
He got up and slipped back into the building. The white mist floated out through the open door and up into the sky where it dissipated. Ben was back in a few moments with the limp body of Beck hefted over one shoulder.
“Can you stand?” he asked me.
I used the crate to ease myself onto my feet. “Yeah, but don’t expect me to run a marathon anytime soon.”
He smiled. “You only need to reach the road.”
CHAPTERTWENTY-FOUR
Ben offeredme his free shoulder which I gladly took, and together we shuffled through the junkyard and to the main road. One touch from Ben and the mirage was lifted. Ben slumped the man off his shoulder and Beck fell like a sack of potatoes onto the ground.
“His body should prevent the magic from working again,” Ben thought aloud before he looked over at me. “Wait here and I’ll fetch Bashful.”
I was only too glad to plop myself onto an overturned box and await his return. A few pedestrians sauntered past, and more than one local jerked to a stop to gape at the wide road.
“Where’d that come from?” one of them, a gentleman in a used suit, asked me.
I grinned. “Magic.”
He pointed at Beck. “And what’s he laying there for?”
My face drooped as I studied the limp body of the bouncer. “He’s, um, taking a nap.”
Relief washed over me when the wide door to the garage opened and Bashful zoomed out of the shop. Ben drove the machine up to me and hopped out to help me into the rear. He noticed the older gentleman who still gawked at us.
“Would you be so kind as to alert the authorities to this gentleman here?” he requested as he nodded down at Beck. “There might be a reward for his capture.”
The man’s eyes lit up. “Of course, sir! Right away!” He scurried off with the enthusiasm that comes with a prize of money.
“We should hurry away, as well,” Ben insisted as he helped me into the rear. “We wouldn’t want to be involved in such matters any further.”
I grasped the edge of the cockpit of the thunder and my ribbon, having been abused so roughly by Beck, came undone. My mirage flickered for a moment before Ben tightened the bow.
“Thanks,” I told him before a thought struck me. I looked up at him with a curious expression. “How can you touch the ribbon and not ruin its magic?”
“I don’t dissolve its powers because the source of its magic also comes from dragon’s blood,” he explained as he nodded at my seat. “But more questions for when we’re on the road.”
I climbed in and sat down in my seat, but my butt crunched atop some papers. “What the?-” I reached under myself and drew out a small stack of ledger-like documents. I studied the columns and rows of names and figures, but nothing appeared familiar. “What are these?”
“Betting forms for thunder races,” Ben told me as he hopped into the driver’s seat. We set off down the road and I was glad to leave the garage behind. “The good doctor is interested in more than just their parts.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “Where did you get these?”
“When I fetched the thunder I noticed a trail of papers leading out the rear door of the garage,” Ben explained as we zoomed down the streets dodging horses and carriages. “The good doctor must not have wanted anyone to see them, so I thought it wise to pick them up myself. According to those cards, he’s bet high and consistently these last six months.”
I paused in my perusal and studied the top of one of the programs. The pages each featured a name which I assumed was the location of the tract. My heart skipped a beat when I recognized two of the names. “Didn’t Mouse say something about trouble in Enastros? And in some Werewald place?”
“He did,” Ben confirmed as he turned his head slightly to look at me. “Why?”
I studied the column that read ‘bet placed.’ “If I’m reading these papers right, then he started betting a lot bigger amounts of money on those races than the ones before them.”
Ben frowned. “That’s very interesting.”
“Makes you wonder what he knew ahead of time,” I mused. Ben faced ahead and an uneasy silence followed. I scooted forward and grasped the back of his chair. “What are you thinking?”
